Proposals and Positions

AISI committees, forums, teams and staff formulate proposals and positions to advance and defend the steel industry in the construction marketplace. We are guided in this process by the following principles:

  • Fairness
  • Transparency
  • Performance

Fairness

We support a fair and open marketplace with a level, pro-competitive playing field for all construction materials. We understand that governments might want to support domestic interests, but we do not believe it is the government’s role to favor one building material over others through regulatory or legislative preference or prescriptive procurement practices. Professional judgment, practical application, fair competition, and respect for our system of building codes can and should determine the best materials for the application and service.

Transparency

We support an open, balanced, consensus-driven process for codes and standards development. AISI actively engages in the development of national model codes and discourages those who attempt to circumvent this process. For the cold-formed steel industry, AISI strives to provide the most open and fair standards development process in structural engineering. Existing and new specification language is tested for clarity and its intimate connection to publicly available research. AISI’s reputation invites collaboration in its standards development process and increases acceptance of its standards. AISI challenges partner and competitor associations towards these same ideals.

Performance

We support material selection by design professionals based on a performance-based assessment that takes into consideration not just initial cost and impacts, but considers serviceability, durability and resiliency over the life of the project. AISI works collaboratively with broad-based codes and standards developers to define common performance objectives for all materials. On this level playing field, AISI’s mission in codes and standards development is to improve the performance of steel structures through the development and use of improved analysis methods and design specifications.